


That Girl Is A (Goddamn) Problem

by auroreanrave



Category: American Horror Story
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Character of Color, Canonical Character Death, F/F, Femslash February, Fix-It, Girl Power, Going to Hell, Rescue Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-16
Updated: 2014-02-16
Packaged: 2018-01-12 17:35:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1193763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/auroreanrave/pseuds/auroreanrave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They stride into Hell, armed to the teeth and looking like nightmares for the demons they've come to stalk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That Girl Is A (Goddamn) Problem

**Author's Note:**

> Fix-It Fic after the finale of AHS: Coven. Contains spoilers for the show although there are some canon divergences and could theoretically take place within the canon. Sort of. Written because girls need to rescue other girls sometimes.
> 
> Title comes from NatalIa Kills' 'Problem'.

They stride into Hell, armed to the teeth and looking like nightmares for the demons they've come to stalk.

Their robes are aflame and black, spectres of flame billowing around them in coronas of fire, and their eyes are aglow, because they are coven and they are furious.

Cordelia knows that Misty and Nan are down here somewhere and as soon as she had awoken her abilities after Fiona's death, she had formulated a plan. A plan, Queenie knows, that has been a bitch and a half to arrange but Nan has been her girl for as long as they've been on this mission, and slapping aside, Misty has done nothing to hurt anyone. She doesn't deserve this; neither of them do.

They're getting their girls back.

They move forward, Cordelia powering forward through the sea of sulphur they're walking on and around them, the horrific, ashen landscape changes and transforms into an inner city suburb, gray brick and crimson skies, the screams of the dead echoing on so loud Queenie can barely hear herself think.

"How are we going to find them?" Zoe asks, her robes torn by gusts of wind so fierce Queenie's surprised they haven't started stripping skin away.

"I know. Members of the Coven trapped here leave off a magical signature. Nan and Misty are trapped here in their own hells but we can find them."

"What about Papa Legba?" Queenie asks. He's a scary dude, even when he's being genial and snorting coke off fancy tables in the Academy. To get on the wrong side of him seems... unwise.

"I have no intention of meeting him. Nan was murdered and Misty was trapped here by her own inability. Neither of them deserve their places here and I have every full intention of bringing them home." Cordelia's voice is strong and sure, a million miles from the meek little teacher she'd first met nearly a year ago, and she turns to Zoe and Queenie as they find streaks of lightning pulsing across the clouds towards them.

"He knows we're here. Conquer and divide. You have your missions."

Zoe nods and grabs Queenie's hand and they share one last look with Cordelia - one that says _don't do anything stupid, you're so cool, I need you to come back, you're our Supreme, bring our girls back_ \- before the lightning crashes down towards them and Queenie yells, her voice alongside Zoe's, " _Descensum!_ "

And then they're gone.

* * *

Zoe feels sick to her stomach but she keeps the idea of finding Nan strong in her mind - sweet, caring, fierce Nan - and tries not to vomit when she's assaulted by the smell of rotting flesh and horrific smells, everything decaying and wrong in the world.

"Come on. Zoe, come on." Zoe lifts her head from where she's pressing it into her knees and finds Queenie looking ahead, one hand pressed to her nose, but still up on her feet. Descending into Hell is a killer on the knees if you do it twice and do it the second time standing.

Very few witches have even tried what they're doing; only a handful more made it back alive. But they're lucky and smart and have the fire of a true Supreme running through their veins, as inexorably linked to Cordelia and the coven as to one another and themselves.

Zoe's feet like they're weighed down with boulders as she inches forward, each step shifting the ground beneath her feet into reddish sand and then cheap, Seventies-style wood panel flooring.

"There up ahead." Queenie points and all of a sudden the rest of the corridor races forward to meet the cheap flooring. It's all faded floral wallpaper and windows built in the walls so that when Zoe goes past, she can see screaming souls, their skin peeled off and their muscles, sinewy and bloody and torn, sliding off their bones like well-cooked meat.

She swallows down the vomit in her throat and spots the two advancing figures coming down the corridor towards her and Queenie, immaculate dark suits and claws.

_Demons._

"I'll show you this world of pain, little girl." The one on the left says to Zoe, and she's immediately hit by a wave of nausea, of revulsion, as the smell of rotting flesh and burning sulfur and it's not vomit that rises in Zoe's throat this time but anger and before she can register it, she _pushes_ with her mind and the demon on the left roars, ramming his claws into his eyes and ripping them out and screaming as black blood and viscera pours down his face.

Queenie pushes with her hands and the demon on the right flies back, soaring down the corridor to land with a wet thunk and a crunch of bone. Zoe moves down the corridor, her demon continuing to roar in impotent rage and pain, before she finds the door she's been looking for. Divination has its perks, after all.

"Ready?" Queenie asks, and Zoe nods, and together they push open the heavy oak doors, a dull light emerging as they step inside.

Inside turns out to be... well. A _palace_.

French, if Zoe can remember from her History clases and the look of Marie Antoinette, and there Nan is, dressed like a 1940s movie star and she looks good, halfway through eating a macaroon. It all feels slightly off and the look of genuine surprise in Nan's eyes is enough to confirm Nan's reality and send Zoe and Queenie hurrying towards her.

"Nan! Come on, we're getting you out of here." Queenie steps forward, hand going to Nan's arm, but Nan moves back, shrugging it off in confusion.

And then Zoe sees it, the glamours of Nan's paradise falling from her eyes. There are tubes, dozens of them, leading from Nan's back into the back of he chaisse longue, and when Zoe moves around the back of the lounge, the tubes are draining down into the floor, blood slick on the ground and hidden by Nan's skirts.

"Jesus, Nan, his isn't heaven. Open your eyes." Zoe points to the tubes and Queenie curses under her breath as she looks herself. Nan doesn't even move, popping the rest of the macaoon into her mouth.

"Guys, I'm fine, I really like it here." Nan is insistent and smiling and her eyes are glazed, and Zoe knows exactly what to do.

" _Concilium._ " Zoe raises her hands and drops them like she's pulling something away, and she can almost feel the curtain drawn over Nan's mind, that shimmering curtain of illusions, and she yanks it away and it turns to ash in her mind.

Nan screams, the scales falling from her mind.

" _Get me the hell out of this thing!_ " She screams and Hell rocks on its hinges.

* * *

The journey back to the surface is easier now they're in a group. Nan is struggling behind them, tearing off chunks of her dress as they move along the corridor, smoke rising from the floor and the smell of brimstone, hot and nauseous. Queenie can taste it in the back of her throat and she doesn't know if puking is somehow different in Hell, but she doesn't want to find out, like at all.

One demon scurries in front of them and Zoe's eyes glow and it bursts into flames and propels itself over a cliff, screaming, and Queenie looks ahead, looking for the ascension spot where, high above them in the real world - as if Hell isn't real, her mind supplies unhelpfully - Myrtle and Kyle are waiting, Misty's body in her magically-enhanced mud and Nan's rescued from her grave.

"Here!" Queenie says, moving to the spot where she, Zoe and Cordelia descended - here the rules are different. Descensum the first way can be anywhere, but the second time around, right into the Hell of Hells, needs a little more specificity.

Nan incinerates a demon of her own, raising one hand to wash it with flame. Queenie looks around - demons are coming, Papa Legba's domain no doubt - and grabs Nan and Zoe's hands.

"Ready?" They nod, and Queenie's last thought before they ascend is _dear God Cordelia don't mess this up_.

* * *

Cordelia has the power of _goddesses_ running through her veins, alighting with every touch and soon she's peeling away reality under her manicured nails to find Misty, to find the girl, to find the one who'd been sweet and beautiful and in love with life.

And Cordelia intends to find her.

She comes to a biology classroom, full of floating jars and the smell of ammonia in the air, thick and pungent as incense. Cordelia can feel the smell of patchouli and jasmine through it all and soon she finds Misty.

Misty is sobbing, helplessly cutting at a live frog until it dies, and it breaks Cordelia's heart, tears at something in her.

"Misty?"

Misty looks up, tears in her eyes, and the frog is alive in her hands once more, the bespectacled teacher angrily for heading once more. That is until Cordelia telekinetically tosses him across the lab, an endlessly long movement that crashes him against glass beakers.

"Cor--Cordelia?" Misty manages and Cordelia smiles, and raises Misty to her feet.

"I'm here. I'm here for you."

"I... I was so scared. They kept making me kill and I - I just - " Misty looks ready to break into tears again, but Cordelia gathers her close.

"I came here for you. Just for you. I'm here to save you."

"Perhaps," a silky voice from the back of the classroom offers, and Cordelia doesn't even need to turn to know Legba's there, "or perhaps she's just spectating."

Cordelia turns. Legba sits on a wooden table, smiling. "She doesn't belong here. She owes you no payment or punishment."

"She got stuck here. That's all that matters."

"I'm asking you. Please let her go. She does not belong here. Not like the others."

"Not like your mother, you mean?" Cordelia closes her eyes, that wound a little too deep and fresh, but forces herself to meet his gaze. His smile is sharp. "Would you like to watch her? I have a front row seat. Smells of catfish, unfortunately..."

"I don't think you're aware of the situation. I've already rescued one of my girls from here, unfairly taken, I might add, so please don't insult my intelligence." Cordelia silently prays that Zoe and Queenie have already fulfilled their end of the operation.

Legba blinks, and then frowns. "The clairvoyant. I liked her. Your girls escaped already." Cordelia flushes with relief, but doesn't let it show.

"Fiona and Marie used her as a deal. Both of them are dead and their deals are void. She's collateral and belongs back home, where she is right now."

"And this one? Your pretty little swamp rat?"

Cordelia blazes with protectiveness. "She's the greatest woman I ever knew, and she is coming home. With or _without_ your blessing."

"You think because you are the new Supreme, you can wander in here like you own the place?"

"Not any Supreme, no - but I'm the first Supreme to born of another. Two lots of power in my veins, and fresh as well. I might not be able to beat you, but I can ruin you."

She shakes the classroom for emphasis and Legba drops the beaker he'd been tossing around in his hands. He smirks, eyes shining with delight. Cordelia glows.

"I like you, girl. Fine. They're both yours, with my best wishes. I respect some leadership when I see it."

"Thank you." Cordelia nods her head, graciously. "I'll be seeing you around."

"Oh, here and there." Legba tips an imaginary cap. Cordelia turns to Misty, holds her in her arms.

"I'm scared." Misty says, and Cordelia presses her mouth to the sweet press of Misty's lips.

"Don't be. I love you." Misty grins and kisses her back -

And then they're rising, rising, rising -

* * *

In the lounge of Miss Robichaux's Academy, life floods into its walls as five women return to their bodies.

Nan sputters, coughing violently, chunks of dust in her lungs, and Myrtle helps her to her feet and into an armchair, her hair a mess and her face pale, but alive.

Kyle embraces Zoe, his dark suit stiff and unyielding, and the tears in his eyes are bright and Zoe kisses them away. Beside them, Queenie laughs, a big chuckle that echoes through the halls because they pulled off the heist of a lifetime, of a goddamn legacy.

And in the middle, Cordelia embraces Misty close as life floods into her body, coursing through her corpse and rejuvenating, restoring it.

Cordelia manages a look around the sitting room - Zoe, Queenie, Myrtle, Nan, Kyle - and down at the girl in her arms. The world glows with light, as if it approves at this triumph, this victory. Her coven are strong and beautiful and powerful and impossible and she couldn't be more _proud_. She will be the greatest Supreme in the history of this coven, and she will do her girls proud.

"Welcome home." Cordelia smiles down at Misty who grins back, tears of joy in her eyes and they kiss a new beginning, one that shimmers in the sun and sings of a brave new world.


End file.
